You were made to
seek God’s truth.
Small Group Questions – Week 5
- Perhaps you have heard it said that all truth is God’s truth. What does that mean? How do you react to this idea? Do you agree or disagree?
Read Luke 24.13-32 together. This is one of the few accounts we have of Jesus after his resurrection, and like the women who first meet him in the garden, it’s peculiar that they don’t recognize Jesus.
13 Now that same day two of them were going to a village called Emmaus, about seven miles from Jerusalem. 14 They were talking with each other about everything that had happened. 15 As they talked and discussed these things with each other, Jesus himself came up and walked along with them; 16 but they were kept from recognizing him.
17 He asked them, “What are you discussing together as you walk along?”
They stood still, their faces downcast. 18 One of them, named Cleopas, asked him, “Are you the only one visiting Jerusalem who does not know the things that have happened there in these days?”
19 “What things?” he asked.
“About Jesus of Nazareth,” they replied. “He was a prophet, powerful in word and deed before God and all the people. 20 The chief priests and our rulers handed him over to be sentenced to death, and they crucified him; 21 but we had hoped that he was the one who was going to redeem Israel. And what is more, it is the third day since all this took place. 22 In addition, some of our women amazed us. They went to the tomb early this morning 23 but didn’t find his body. They came and told us that they had seen a vision of angels, who said he was alive. 24 Then some of our companions went to the tomb and found it just as the women had said, but they did not see Jesus.”
25 He said to them, “How foolish you are, and how slow to believe all that the prophets have spoken! 26 Did not the Messiah have to suffer these things and then enter his glory?” 27 And beginning with Moses and all the Prophets, he explained to them what was said in all the Scriptures concerning himself.
28 As they approached the village to which they were going, Jesus continued on as if he were going farther. 29 But they urged him strongly, “Stay with us, for it is nearly evening; the day is almost over.” So he went in to stay with them.
30 When he was at the table with them, he took bread, gave thanks, broke it and began to give it to them. 31 Then their eyes were opened and they recognized him, and he disappeared from their sight. 32 They asked each other, “Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?”
- Since this is a longer passage, take a few moments and talk about what’s going on here. Here are a couple questions to guide the conversation.
- What stands out to you? What do you notice?
- What do you like?
- What don’t you like? (In other words, what challenges, confuses, etc.?)
- Look again at verse 26. What’s happening here? What is Jesus doing? And what exactly does he want them (and us) to understand?
- Now look again at verse 25. You might get the impression that Jesus is frustrated that he has to explain this. Here’s something to consider, though. NO ONE understood how all of scripture pointed to HIM…not the disciples, not his most devoted followers, not his family, not the scribes nor the experts of the day. NO ONE. (At least not until this point.) What, then, can we understand about God’s truth as it’s given to us in scripture?
Jesus starts talking about this soon after he went public. Read Luke 4.16-21.
6 He went to Nazareth, where he had been brought up, and on the Sabbath day he went into the synagogue, as was his custom. He stood up to read, 17 and the scroll of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him. Unrolling it, he found the place where it is written:
18 “The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
19 to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.”
20 Then he rolled up the scroll, gave it back to the attendant and sat down. The eyes of everyone in the synagogue were fastened on him. 21 He began by saying to them, “Today this scripture is fulfilled in your hearing.”
- Jesus is quoting the beginning of Isaiah 61. (Go look if you want to!) What, exactly, is Jesus saying here? And what does that mean for us?
- What story is God trying to tell? What do we know about God’s truth because of Jesus?
John 1.1-5
In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. 2 He was with God in the beginning. 3 Through him all things were made; without him nothing was made that has been made. 4 In him was life, and that life was the light of all mankind. 5 The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.
- It’s Jesus. It’s always been HIM, and with the resurrection, we have the assurance that it will always be HIM. He is “the way, the truth, and the life.”
- Let’s go back to the first story one last time. It ends with the big reveal. At the breaking of bread, “their eyes were opened and they recognized him.” (And then he disappears!) Crazy, yeah?
- BUT, what do we do with this? How, then, should we pray – for ourselves and for others? What is your prayer as you seek God’s truth?
*Ideas & questions with reference to
A Meal with Jesus, Ch. 5&6, by Tim Chester
